Cory jumped through the portal. It washed over her body like liquid mercury, hugging her curves and moving aside as she fell through the gossamer membrane. She froze on the other side, hovering stock still a quarter inch above the ground.
All of a sudden, the caves felt a whole lot colder.
Jason took a step forward but then paused. His grin slowly faded as he watched the frozen scene before him. It was simple. All he had to do was take a couple of steps and hop into his apartment. Theoretically, Tyler and Corinne would spring into motion from his perspective, and they could move on with their lives. They could confront Tyler and figure out all the questions that had been plaguing him ever since this whole thing started.
Jason stood frozen, his jaw clenching and unclenching as he stared at the swirling portal.
It felt as if he was standing on the precipice of a cliff. Looking down at crashing waves far, far below. All he had to do was jump to discover whether the strange system that upended his life was permanent or transient. If it was transient, the question became why had it come all of a sudden? If it was permanent...well. That was a whole other can of worms.
Stepping through the portal was the obvious next step. Except...the thing was, Jason didn’t want to. Going through that portal meant returning to normalcy. What if all of this was just a strange dream caused by his encounter with that mugger? Would he forget all this once he stepped through? Would he have to plod through classes as if this never happened? Would everyone else even remember?
He couldn’t risk it.
Jason chuckled under his breath as he turned his back to the portal. The vast, dim cavern dimly echoed with his soft steps.
That was it, wasn’t it? It all came down to that simple phrase. Going back was too risky. Too dangerous. In a paradoxical reversal, the monster-infested cave system was the safer option. At least for him. At least right now.
In fact, Jason thought. This problem could be simplified further. All of the complicated reasonings and explanations were all well and good. But at the end of the day. Only one thing mattered. This minor temporal rift known as the Tutorial was the first time in a long time where Jason had been excited to see what was around the next bend. It was the first time he’d felt his blood truly course through his veins with excitement.
Jason turned back to consider the portal.
At the end of the day, he didn’t want to jump through. So he wouldn’t.
Jason’s grin returned. The dark tunnel on the far side of the cavern beckoned him. Maybe eventually, he would come back to the portal, but he was in a temporal rift. He literally had all the time in the world to explore, level up, and hopefully clear this cave system of all the Grothlits.
There had also been the mystery of the gray health that was still undiscovered.
Jason flicked his status open to check his health. Satisfied it was full, he rushed down the far tunnel. The tunnel twisted in on itself, like all the other tunnels, but in moments, it opened up to another identical cave. The Grothlit inside barely registered Jason’s presence before it was set upon by a flurry of flying fists and snapping kicks.
Jason watched his health carefully, noting how no matter how many scratches he sustained, his gray health didn’t increase. When the monster died, all he had to do was wait, and all his wounds would close.
He rushed to the next chamber and tackled the pair of Grothlits waiting for him there. He quickly culled the smaller one, then let the larger one inflict a deep gash on his shoulder. A tearing sensation radiated from his core to his extremities, and he watched as a part of his health bar turned gray.
So it wasn’t that the Grothlits had some poison. It was that large enough wounds created semi-permanent damage that couldn’t be easily healed. The gray health damage was only a fraction of the total hit, but the fact that it didn’t heal meant that it was far more important. It did mean, though, that as long as he was careful to avoid serious injury, these Grothlits couldn’t hurt him.
Jason grinned as he tore through the offending Grothlit.
Jason continued like this, ripping through the cave system and leaving a trail of bodies in his wake. He was injured repeatedly, sustaining dozens if not hundreds of tiny cuts from the Grothlits’ numerous claws, but never did he allow the beasts to deal enough damage to grant him gray health.
As he fought, he learned that stamina could also get grayed out. When resting, it ticked up slowly, but if he exerted himself too hard, the end of the bar would turn gray and inaccessible. The more tired he grew, the more easily he gained gray stamina. Presumably, mana also followed the same paradigm, though he had no way to confirm that at the moment.
After some time, Jason eventually jogged into a cavern whose Grothlit was already dead. A closer inspection revealed a vague chair-shaped dent in its back, revealing that he had looped all around. Jason kept going through the tunnels, finding more lifeless caverns until he came, once again, upon the swirling portal.
“Eleven chambers, organized in a loop,” Jason hummed to himself as he leaned against a convenient stalagmite. Except for the one cavern he’d encountered with Cory, there were never more than two Grothlits in a room, and their levels ranged from three to seven. Once he got the hang of dealing with them, even the higher-level monsters were fairly simple to take care of.
Jason turned to his notifications, surprised that he had somehow unconsciously suppressed them during his rampage.
‘ding!’ ‘You have slain a lvl 6 Grothlit. Experience awarded’
...
‘ding!’ ‘You have slain a lvl 4 Grothlit. Experience awarded’
'ding!' 'Congratulations! Your level has increased to 5. 5 stat points awarded'
'ding!' 'Congratulations! Your level has increased to 6. 5 stat points awarded'
'ding!' '[Regeneration] has reached level 3’
'ding!' '[Regeneration] has reached level 4'
'ding!' '[Stab Resistance] has reached level 3'
...
'ding!' '[Stab Resistance] has reached level 5'
Jason smiled at the improvements in all his skills. Of all the skills, [Stab Resistance] was the one that had the most visible effect. It made the Grothlit claws skitter over his skin instead of digging deep and drawing blood. The improvements to [Regeneration] were also welcome as they reduced the amount of waiting between fights with every level.
With all the levels coming in, Jason pulled up his status to allocate his attributes. Constitution was serving him pretty well, but dumping all 15 of his points into that stat would be shortsighted. A little strength and dexterity would serve him better in the long term. Plus, he liked having even stats.
'ding!' 'You have invested 8 points into Constitution'
'ding!' 'You have invested 3 points into Strength'
'ding!' 'You have invested 4 points into Dexterity'
Jason grinned as his health and stamina increased explosively.
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Jason Mendel
Level: 6
————————————————————
Strength 15
Constitution 25
Dexterity 15
Intelligence 10
Wisdom 10
Unspent Stat Points 0
————————————————————
Health : 96% |████████████████████████▒| 86/90
Stamina : 21% |█████▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▁▒▒▒▒▒▒▒▒▒▒| 15/70
Mana : 100% |█████████████████████████| 40/40
————————————————————
Skills:
- [Regeneration] [4] Grants permanent
Resistances
- [Stab Resistance] [5] You have repeatedly been impaled by a Grothlit's claws. Your flesh hardens and grows more resilient against such attacks in the future
————————————————————
Jason blinked the exhaustion from his eyes as he noticed how low his stamina had gotten. To be fair, it had been an extremely long day. From waking up early to attend lectures, followed by nearly four hours at Billy’s, and then all this. Yeah, he was exhausted.
He looked at the portal and the bed he knew was on the other side of it. After a moment, he shook his head and walked to the adjacent room. It was time to test Cory’s sleeping idea.
Historically, moss was more commonly used as insulation than as bedding, but that didn’t make it nonfunctional. Especially if he stacked enough of it in a comfy pile.
Jason set to work, idly watching as his Stamina bar dipped while he worked. The glowing moss was ubiquitous but relatively thin on the ground. By the time he had collected a sufficiently comfortable pile, he’d stripped the adjacent chamber completely of moss and light. Luckily, the moss lost its luminescence after being torn from the ground after a couple of minutes.
Jason took a quick drink from one of the cleanest pools of water, marveling at the earthy, metallic flavor of the cave water. Briefly, he considered trying to eat the Grothlit corpses but rejected the idea after a moment. He had neither fire to cook the meat nor an assurance that his body could even digest the alien creatures in the first place.
Satisfied he’d done all he could, Jason settled into the surprisingly soft pile of natural fibers. It was a little cold and damp, but Jason couldn’t be happier. He fell asleep to thoughts of different ways he could train his skills even further.
----------------------------------------
Claws tore through the bedding like they weren’t even there. Jason was wrenched from his sleep. His heart nearly burst from his chest as he jerked upright, only for a warm, wet blanket of writhing claws to shred his cheek to ribbons. The chittering croon of a Grothlit echoed above him as the attack left him with a fresh batch of gut-wrenching gray health.
Jason screamed, flipping to protect his face as he thundered to his feet. The Grothlit clutched tenaciously to his back, turning his shoulders into minced meat. He grabbed one of its waving appendages and pulled. The appendage snapped out of its socket with a sickening pop. Jason blinked hazily at the dismembered limb in shock.
'ding!' '[Stab Resistance] has reached level 6'
The notification shocked Jason out of his stupor, and he fell onto his back. Agony coursed through him as the Grothlit’s claws broke through his stab resistance and were forced deeper into his back. The move stunned the monster, and Jason took full advantage. He spun to face the thing and held it still with one hand while the other started pounding.
Fragile bones cracked and broke as he pulverized the Grothlit between the ground and his fist.
‘ding!’ ‘You have slain a lvl 4 Grothlit. Experience awarded’
Jason staggered to his feet. His hoodie was shredded, holding onto his left shoulder by a single, struggling thread. Blood soaked the fabric nearly to saturation and caused clumps of dead moss to stick to him in odd locations.
“Whooooooooo!” Jason crowed, throwing his hands in the air as adrenaline made his heart thunder in his ears. His call echoed through the cave systems, and an innumerable rumbling of Grothlit claws responded. He watched with slightly manic eyes as the first of the creatures appeared from the far tunnel.
Already, Jason’s wounds were healing. [Stab Resistance] had protected him from the majority of the Grothlit’s damage, and [Regeneration] was working overtime in the aftermath to close the few cuts that had broken through. It would take longer to be completely free of injury, but he had more than enough health and resistance to deal with what was coming.
Time blurred as Jason leaped into the fray. The first Grothlit succumbed swiftly to his strikes, but two more popped out of the far tunnel a second later. Jason turned to face them, only for more of the creatures to emerge like a never-ending tide of bodies.
Jason fought like a man possessed. Punches broke bones, and kicks tore off limbs. He danced out of the way of waving appendages with the ease of long practice as his opponents grew increasingly frustrated with every second. Jason’s stamina dipped, unable to sustain the level of expenditure that the situation warranted, but Jason barely cared.
He was lost to the fight. Enjoying every punch and feint. Relishing every kill. It was a foreign feeling to Jason, but he let himself sink deep into it. Grothlits died in droves, littering the floor around the portal in piles.
Then, abruptly, there were no more.
‘ding!’ ‘You have slain a lvl 5 Grothlit. Experience awarded’
...
‘ding!’ ‘You have slain a lvl 4 Grothlit. Experience awarded’
'ding!' 'Congratulations! Your level has increased to 7. 5 stat points awarded'
'ding!' '[Regeneration] has reached level 5'
Jason gasped, feeling his health recover to full after a few minutes. He popped open his status and grumbled as he noticed the fight had left him with more gray health than he had started with.
Health : 87% |██████████████████████▒▒▒| 78/90
Stamina : 60% |███████████████▁▁▁▁▒▒▒▒▒▒| 42/70
Luckily, his stamina had improved drastically overnight. It lent credence to the idea that gray health recovered overnight. Or even just over time. In principle, the effect might have less to do with sleep and more to do with time. Regardless, the fact that Cory’s theory proved true was phenomenal news.
Jason dismissed his interface, eyes locking on the dark tunnel that had spawned all the Grothlits.
He burst into the dark chamber, finding it completely empty of Grothlits. Eyes narrowed, Jason continued onto the next chamber, only to find it empty as well. Turning back, he suddenly heard the telltale chitter of a Grothlit behind him.
Running back, he found a small Grothlit skittering around the corners of the black room. It was pitch black, so Jason located and crushed the beast by following the sound it made as it moved.
‘ding!’ ‘You have slain a lvl 3 Grothlit. Experience awarded’
Which meant...that these monsters spawned in the dark.
Jason grinned at the phenomenal news as he left the black chamber. He’d been worrying yesterday that he’d killed all the Grothlits. Without the little buggers, he didn’t have a great avenue to level up his skills. This discovery meant that he’d have access to an endless stream of monsters to grind in order to level up his stats.
He’d have to figure out the exact mechanics of monster spawning in order to capitalize on this fully. Like, how dark was dark enough, and was there any way to speed up the spawning rate? Or maybe it wasn’t darkness but the absence of the glowing moss that enabled monster spawning?
He’d have to check to see if any monsters spawned next to the glowing portal...
Jason glanced at his still-diminished stamina, then turned away from the dark cavern to find a more isolated place to sleep.
Tomorrow.
Tomorrow, he’d figure it all out.